Gautam Gambhir was born on 14 October 1981 to Deepak Gambhir in New Delhi. A student of the prestigious Modern School in New Delhi, he took to cricket at the age of 10. An alumnus of Hindu College, University of Delhi, he stayed with his maternal uncle Pawan Gulati, whom he also regarded as his mentor.
Sanjay Bharadwaj of Lal Bahadur Shastri Academy Raju Tandon were his coaches. He got his first break when Gambhir was selected by the National Cricket Academy in Bangalore in 2000.
He made his first-class debut when he represented Delhi in domestic cricket in 1999-2000. Left-handed Gambhir was first noticed when he scored a double century playing for the Board President’s XI against the touring Zimbabwean team in 2002. Subsequently, he made his ODI debut in 2003 against Bangladesh in the TVS Cup.
In November 2004, he made his Test debut against Australia in the fourth Test match of the Border Gavaskar Trophy. Gambhir, however, cemented his place as a Test batsman when he scored 96 against South Africa and posted his maiden Test century against Bangladesh in December 2004.
He made his T20I debut against Scotland in 2007. The high point of his cricketing career was his 97-run knock against Sri Lanka in the finals of the ICC Cricket World Cup in 2011. It helped India lift the ODI World Cup after a gap of 38 years.
Before that, Gambhir was named the ICC Test Player of the Year for the year 2009. He had a great stint at the IPL when as the skipper of Kolkata Knight Riders, he helped the team lift their first title in 2012 when they defeated Chennai Super Kings.
He retired from all forms of cricket in December 2018. Gambhir was elected as a Member of Parliament (MP) in March 2019 when he contested from East Delhi, representing BJP, in the Indian general elections.
